Quit Smoking Critic

Quitting smoking is one of the hardest things to do!

Quitting smoking will probably be one of the hardest things you’ll ever do in your life. It was a definite struggle for me and it continues to be one to this very day. My struggles to quit smoking helped me realise how difficult it can be to quit habits you once loved. Nonetheless I finally kicked the habit, but not before making attempt after attempt time and time again. It’s not impossible to quit smoking but you should expect it to be a bit difficult. Smoking can actually be pleasant – why else would we do it?! I started smoking years ago and enjoyed every minute of it. I never really thought much about what the habit was doing to my body. I understood I was slowly poisoning myself but I wasn’t too concerned about that. All I knew was that sitting down, lighting up a cigarette, and have a smoke after a long day made me feel fantastic.

Smoking made me feel like cr*p

Eventually my habit started to gradually affect me. I was fairly young yet became winded very easily. I physically couldn’t keep up with people my own age. I finally decided to quit cold turkey and thought that would be the end of things. I was wrong. Can you imagine what it would be like to never eat again? All of your life you’ve eaten three square meals a day, and now you can no longer eat again. The cookies, cakes, ice cream, pork chops, spaghetti and burgers are all off of the table. I don’t think anyone could deal with something like that. This is what the concept of going cold turkey sounded like to me. I lasted about two weeks the first time I went cold turkey. Later on I found out from other ex-smokers that two weeks was a really long time! When I started smoking again I felt disappointed in myself. Fortunately, I got back on the horse and did so for an additional three or four days. I just couldn’t seem to let the habit go.

Finally, I gave up, and here’s how

By this time I gave up and didn’t bother pursuing the idea of quitting smoking for about two months. During that time I kept putting off the idea of going cold turkey again until I felt I was truly ready to quit. I can honestly say I was a bit discouraged during this time. There was nothing stopping me from putting away the cigarettes except me. To me that meant I either didn’t have the willpower to quit or that deep down I wasn’t ready to quit. Either way it was enough to make me feel upset with myself. I would feel proud of myself if I said that this was the first time I gave up smoking but it’s not. I tried the exact same technique over and over again. I would go cold turkey for a month and start smoking again for a few months. I’d quit smoking for six or seven weeks and then light up again. It took a lot of trial and error before I realised I needed to take my pursuits much more seriously. If you’re currently attempting to kick your smoking